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‘I think you’re thinking of Mayberry,’ she said, naming a fictional town in a 1960s television programme where the sun always shone and people ambled down to the drug store for an ice-cream soda.
‘So your town isn’t like that?’
Ha
‘And while you’re thinking …?’ He glanced around at the darkening streets, the steady traffic.
‘I’ll figure something out.’ She could fetch her bag from the hotel, find some place cheaper. It was a start, at least. ‘Why do you care, anyway?’ Ha
The man’s eyes narrowed even as his lips twitched. ‘Don’t worry,’ he told her dryly. ‘I have no intention of enacting any of the options that are undoubtedly racing through your terrified mind. Let me introduce myself properly.’ He slid a wallet from the inside pocket of his coat—of course he’d keep it there—and from it extracted a crisp white business card.
Ha
‘Impressive.’ Of course anyone could print up a fake business card, even an expensive-looking one like that. This man could still be a drug dealer or a slave trader or who knew what else. She folded her arms across her chest, conscious of the chilly wind ruffling her hair and cutting through her parka.
‘I can see you’re not convinced.’
‘I’m not sure why you’re here.’
‘At least you’re finally showing some common sense,’ he remarked dryly. ‘To tell you the truth, I feel a bit responsible for the theft of your things.’
‘Why? I was the one who forced you to let that little boy go.’
‘You didn’t force anything,’ he told her a bit sharply, and Ha
‘Sorry,’ she said, her lips twitching. ‘I distracted you then from your manly effort.’
He didn’t like that either, judging by his scowl. ‘I could have come over sooner,’ he told her. ‘I saw what those kids were doing.’
‘You watched?’
‘I waited a moment too long,’ he clarified. ‘And in any case, you don’t have many options.’
That was certainly true. ‘I’m still not sure how that affects you,’ Ha
‘You can stay the night at my hotel. In the morning I can help you sort something out with the police and the embassy.’
He made it sound so simple. Maybe there was a get-out-of-jail-free card after all. ‘That’s very nice of you,’ Ha
‘The Kholodov.’
‘The Kholodov?’ It was one of the most luxurious hotels in Moscow, and way, way out of her budget. And he, she recalled from the card, was Sergei Kholodov. That Kholodov.
Now his mouth kicked up at one corner, and even though it still wasn’t really a smile it transformed his face, lightening his eyes, softening his features, so Ha
‘You’ve heard of it.’
‘Hasn’t everyone?’
He shrugged even as his mouth quirked a little more, revealing a surprising dimple. The assassin had a dimple. She felt another bolt of awareness, as if her senses had been struck by lightning. It wasn’t, she decided, an unpleasant sensation. Not at all.
‘So,’ he said, ‘you might as well stay there.’
Ha
‘If you’re worried about security, you can take a taxi yourself to the hotel. I’ll pay for the fare.’
‘You don’t—’
He arched an eyebrow. ‘You don’t have any money, do you? And trust me, it is no trouble. I have empty rooms. I have plenty of money. And,’ he added, glancing at his watch, ‘I have things to do. So make up your mind.’
When he put it like that, it sounded sensible. And surely her best option. ‘Okay,’ Ha
‘I told you, it is no trouble.’ Sergei stretched one arm out towards the street and within seconds a taxi cab had screeched to a halt in front of him. Sergei dismissed it, and the next one he flagged as well, explaining tersely, ‘They’re both unmarked. You’ll feel safer in an official taxi, with a meter.’ His consideration for such a detail touched her.
Finally a legit taxi pulled to the kerb, and Sergei opened the door. ‘The Kholodov,’ he told the driver, handing him a wad of rubles. He glanced at Ha
Sufficient? It was crazy. Yet she understood what he was asking, that he was taking these measures to make her feel safe, and she appreciated it more than she could put into words. He’d saved her, quite literally. ‘Thank you. I don’t know what to—’
‘Go.’ He practically pushed her towards the cab, and then slammed the door as soon as she’d slid into the seat.
‘Say,’ she finished in a whisper as the cab sped away into the darkness and she wondered if she’d ever see her saviour again.
CHAPTER TWO
‘YOU wanted to know about the girl?’
Sergei glanced up from the papers he’d been sca
Ha
Even now he found himself thinking about the violet of her eyes, those rose-pink lips. He wondered what kind of figure her bulky parka had hid. But even more so than her physical charms, of which he acknowledged she had several, he’d been bizarrely fascinated—and irritated—by her honesty. Her optimism. She’d seemed so … unspoiled. When had he last encountered a person—a woman—like that?
‘She’s settled?’ he asked tersely. That was all he needed to know.
‘Yes, in the grand suite.’
He’d given her the best room in the hotel. Stupid, perhaps, and u
Yet in that moment on the steps when Ha